Unemployed Elephants Lead to Bangkok Traffic Jams

by Kelvin Ng

But while the sightings of the gentle pachyderm in the Thai capital may be a treat for city residents, they are proof of how threatened the animal's lives and sustainability have become in a country for whom the elephant has become closely identified with.

Driven by a lack of work in their hometowns and unable to adequately feed their elephants, the mahouts who used to steer their charges in the lush forests of northeastern Thailand now find themselves foraging in the busy, congested streets of Bangkok.

They buy fruits for their elephants and resell it to those who wish to feed the gentle, 2 to 3 metre-tall giants. For about 20 baht (52 U.S. cents), a person can feed the elephant two bananas the mahouts carry with them.

Two bananas can hardly sustain an animal, which veterinarians say consumes 200 to 250 kilogrammes of food daily, or about 10 percent of its body weight.

"Mahouts may stay for two months, until they have collected enough money for their elephants' food," said Alongkorn Mahannop, a veterinarian at the Dusit Zoo, who treats many of the sick elephants here.

Because the mahouts ply busy streets, there are often many kindhearted people who will pay enough for most of an elephant's daily food. Some Thais will even pay to crawl under the belly of an elephant for good luck.

There are about 40 elephants, most of them female, in Bangkok now, says Dr Alongkorn, who adds that cow elephants are usually easier to handle.

The elephants and their mahouts often camp out in open areas or unused lots in the city. But as Soraida Salwala, founder of Friends of the Asian Elephants, pointed out: "Bangkok is not meant for elephants." For many, the plight of the elephants is a sad one for an animal has long enjoyed the adulation of Thais. A white elephant adorned the red flag of Siam, ancient Thailand. Siamese kings rode on the backs of elephants as they went to war.

In more recent years, elephants have hauled felled timber logs in northern and northeastern Thailand. However, a 1987 ban on logging put many elephant handlers and their charges out of work.

Some elephants have since been retrained to entertain tourists, said Alongkorn. According to him, there are about 200 such elephants in Pattaya, 150 in Phuket, and 30 in Surat Thani, although there are some that are still unemployed.

In Surin, a province 457 kilometres from Bangkok, mahouts and their elephants form the largest group of those who make their way to the capital yearly.

There is not enough work and food in Surin, says Dr Chisanu Tiyacharoensri, head of the Wild Animals Rescue Federation.

"Not just the mahout needs to eat. He depends on his elephant to feed his mother, brothers, and sisters," said Dr Alongkorn, who is also a business development director with the Zoological Organization.

"In the past, the elephants could eat the leaves off the trees and the grass too. But after the agriculture ministry started growing more eucalyptus trees for the paper industry, the elephants had less food," he said, making a link between agricultural policies and the environment and the elephants' situation.

A mahout who is already hard pressed to earn enough for he and his family's own meals can barely afford to provide the food that his elephant needs daily. Thus, the long journey to Bangkok on the back a 10- wheeler truck, which is sometimes seems the easier way out for a desperate mahout.

"Most of the elephants, when they first come to Bangkok, are very thin," said Dr Alongkorn.

One such elephant died on the way from Surin to Bangkok on Jun 25. The English-language daily Bangkok Post reported that the starving animal had devoured a 50-kg sack of uncooked rice, and later drank about 200 liters of water. Dr Alongkorn, who performed the autopsy, says the elephant died from indigestion.

In addition to his duties at the zoo, Dr Alongkorn treats the Bangkok elephants almost everyday. Most have to be de-wormed, and some suffer from colic and diarrhea. The veterinarian conceded that unclean water and dirty food may be the cause of the elephants' ailments.

Soraida says that besides suffering the pollution and grime of the big city, the elephant also gets stressed from walking long stretches and being touched by people.

"We never know when they are stressed. If they get aggressive and start kicking people, or hurting them with their trunk, who will be responsible?" she asked.

City officials have tried banning the elephants from Bangkok, most recently in March, to prevent accidents and deaths. Police officers herded the mahouts and their elephants and arranged transport to get them out of Bangkok, but that failed to address the real problem -- the lack of work of mahouts and elephants.

Soraida's foundation has been rallying the government and the city authorities to avoid stop-gap measures like this. Dr Chinasu and Soraida believe that the approach to help the mahouts has to be multi-pronged. Create jobs for them, and they will stay out of the city, said Soraida.

Her seven-year uphill battle has finally begun to see progress. The Tourism Authority of Thailand will open the Baan Taklang elephant center in Surin by end-August, to try give work to mahouts and their elephants.

"Visitors will get to see the culture, the way of life of the villagers. There will be shows by mahouts and elephant trappers. If the people in Surin are given this job, then at least they won't have to wander in Bangkok looking for food for the elephants," said Chujit Pramodthayakul, an assistant director in TAT's planning division.

Adds Chujit: "We don't like to see elephants wandering in Bangkok. They should be in their natural (habitat)."

Between 12 and 15 elephants and their mahouts will be hired in this pilot project. Chujit explains that the difficulty in caring and feeding for elephants has prevented TAT from hiring more. Other government agencies could help employ the rest, she says. Past projects to get them to promote tourism have had mixed results.

Dr Chisanu of the Wild Animals Rescue Federation suggested that the forestry department hire the elephants and their mahouts as forest rangers. Alternatively, the elephants could be used as transport in areas inaccessible to motor vehicles.

If given a choice, most mahouts would rather let their elephants stay home, where forests instead of busy roads abound, says Dr Chisanu.

"If you compare it to staying in Surin, they have no food. I've talked to many mahouts in Bangkok. They say it's worse here -- they're treated like beggars. They have no way out. If they have no income, the elephants have no food," he added.

Mahout Thongsuk Mali-Ngarm agrees. "I myself can find a job in Surin, but if my elephant can't find food there, we have no choice but to come to Bangkok again," he told the Bangkok Post.

The quest for survival and love for his elephant makes Thongsuk, like other mahouts, risk the uncomfortable trip to Bangkok. And until more work can be found, they will keep returning to the capital, even if the authorities force them to leave. "I can't watch my elephant die," Thongsuk said.